Last night was session one of Jade Rhapsody, the Dragon-blooded chapter of the ongoing story started in Obsidian Requiem, this time run by Jenna. Here's the logo:

The PCs are as follows:

• Cynis Magel (Jimmy M.) - Shy, young, patrician-born Water Aspect and adopted into the most decadent of the Great Houses after her Exaltation. A walking study in culture shock. Female, in her early twenties.

• Ledaal Sen'rei (Chris R.) - Air-aspected sorceror and mechanical prodigy. Male, about fifteen years old. I'm not sure on the spelling of the name.

• Mnemon Nayx (Jimmy H.) - Water-aspect sailor with a grudge against Abyssals. Particularly the Night-forged. Male.

• Tepet Ilyra (Chris M.) - Warrior, survivor of the Tepet defeat at the hands of the Bull of the North. Female.

• Tepet Illystra (Terra) - Terra wasn't feeling well, and wasn't at the session.

For completeness, here are the major NPCs with us that I know of so far:

• Nikene Poni - Young writer from Seven Willows. Was captured by the Dragon-blooded and carted off to become a servant, until it was learned that she had information on the transformation of Seven Willows into a shadowland.

• Tepet Cayhar - Female, member of the Stone Horses (the 11th legion of the Imperial Army)?

• Nellens Larian - Bish.

We've also encountered some folks from Jenna's stories (posted here), such as Bertram.

Basic plot:

Some influential Dragon-blooded have decided that the current inattention being paid to threats in the Threshold cannot continue, and arrange an unofficial Wyld Hunt, composed primarily of members of the Empire that don't seem to fit very well.

The session consisted of a dinner party to introduce the characters to one another, and then the voyage to the threshold began. The Dragon-blooded are on Nyax's ship, which serves as the fleet's flagship. We were told that a witness to the fall of Seven Willows was on board, and she was questioned. Sen'rei has been granted guardianship over her, and Magel is contemplating hooking the two up because the boy clearly needs to focus on something besides books and mechanisms.

Here is the game thus far (since I've not been keeping up with it very well)…

This story is taking polace concurrent with the end of the first run of Obsidian Requiem.

Session 0 (09/16/2005) - Preludes, pretty much. PCs are invited to join unofficial Wyld Hunt, meet some of the folks.

Session 1 (09/30/2005) - Dinner Party. Wyld Hunt departs in ships. We question Poni. See my previous entry for details.

Session 2 (10/14/2005) - On the High Seas. The fleet is attacked by a large multiheaded dragon.

Session 3 (11/11/2005?) - On the High Seas. After coming across a pirate ship, the Exalts encounter a Deathlord, The Lantern on Dark Water with Salt in Her Hair. Arrived in Nexus. Don't recall much beyond Perius arranging to help with crimes. This may have actually been the same session as #3.

Session 4 (12/9/2005) - In Nexus. Met up with Guild representative, got info on stolen bracelet. While investigating, the group begins to suspect that their enemies are near, and the object they are looking for is more powerful than it might seem. Explore catacombs. Moved by a dream, Nyax suddenly sets sail for Seven Willows in the middle of the night, leaving everyone along with him to wonder what's going on. Discovered Seven Willows refugee camp.

Session 5 (12/23/2005) - Last night's session, to be summarized later (hopefully)

(I'm not sure whether Session 4 was in late October or early November, and it may in fact have been two sessions. The above is my best guess.)

23 Descending Air, Realm Year 768

It has been four weeks since this journey began. I thought that, nearing the end of the year as we are, this might be a good time to recount my experiences thus far.

_Ø-(. . ) <— This is me writing! Not a very good representation, I think!

Anyway, it is, of course, no big secret that I was not born to my House. When I was adopted into Cynis after the blood showed itself, my ties to my birth-family were legally and officially severed. In theory, I am the equal of a Dynastic-born Dragon-blood, and I cannot honestly say that I am treated otherwise by most. At least, not since I've been out of school.

Still, it has long been clear that my House hopes for a good return on their investment. As I am clearly no soldier, nor a bureaucrat, nor sorceror, nor monk, none of the traditional secondary schools seemed a useful path to lead me to excel. And, in truth, I would not be content with such a … narrow education anyway. I have studied the teachings of great warriors, magicians, legalists, and priests, and taken what I have found useful there, but these are tools, not a goal in themselves. I long ago decided to forge my own path … which is fine, but does not help one to find where to begin.

I was keeping my eyes open for opportunities.

One recently revealed itself, cloaked in the form of an invitation to visit the household of Cathak Bertram, the famous hero, of whom I was aware even before being touched by the Dragons. I did not know what the purpose of the invitation was beyond the nebulous details in the invitation, but it is not every day that I receive invitations from such as he.

Upon arrival, I met the heads of the house and my belongings were taken to my room. I had a brief interview with Bertram himself … I was somewhat in awe of such a reknowned personage, but of course it was not meet to show it too readily. He wished to know my feelings on the current state of the Realm, and invited me to join an expedition to the Threshold to inquire into some reports of ill omen. A sort of unofficial Wyld Hunt.

Of course, I accepted. Ganbare ne, Magel? Tatakae!** (*^_^*)

I was offered free run of the house aside from a few areas reserved for the family … and, of course, the Manse proper. I encountered a strange old man in the Library, apparently an advisor of some sort. I was not really certain what to make of him. Later, we had a small gathering at dinner for those who had arrived already. Naturally, it was quite different from what I was used to. Among the people I met there were:

Ledaal Sen'rei - A boy, apparently a savant of some sort. He had an odd mechanical contrivance in the form of a pet. Sen'rei could stand to have a few years education, perhaps with Cynis … the boy was almost completely oblivious to the social niceties.

Tepet Ilyra - A warrior, child of the Fire Dragon. I believe she belongs to the Rocky Equine legion or something of that sort. Apparently she was involved in that big battle that Tepets are always mumbling about in their sleep.

Mnemon Nyax - Water aspected like myself. He captains the vessel that is to serve as our flagship. His teeth are rather sharp looking … Interesting!

Tepet Cayhar - Ilyra's superior, I believe? Wears an eye patch.

Nellens Larian - Tall! And soooo pretty! More of him later…

Some of the expedition still had yet to arrive, so I didn't meet them until later. At first I thought that the list mistakenly had a duplicate entry … it said “Tepet Illystra & Co.”. But no. It turns out that there are actually two Tepet Fire-aspected soldiers who were in that battle in the north, who happen to have similar names. It could've been extremely confusing, but Ilyra keeps to herself for the most part.

If there had been two or three more Magels I think we could've simply stayed where we were and let our foes in the Threshold give themselves up! Luckily for them, there's only one me! Ha! (^____^)

At any rate, after dinner we retired for the evening. I wonder how many people lost money betting that I'd invite half the serving staff to my bed…

Preparations had been going on for some time, so we were ready to embark the next day. Illystra & Co. would catch up with us en route. I won't go into many details of the voyage … it isn't all that entertaining or eventful a story. But there are a few tidbits.

For example, Nyax's ship is very interesting! The hull is made of a very old, strong material. I'm sure some of the Dynasts are glad for that! The colors they turned once we hit deep water were rather interesting. ( ~ . ^ )

Once underway, we discovered that we had a passenger. A girl from the Threshold named Nikene Poni, apparently a survivor of an attack by Anathema on some place called Seven Willows, our destination. Horrible! I thought about comforting the poor thing, but then I remembered Sen'rei's near total lack of social ability. Chance!

I encouraged the two of them to spend time together. I'm not sure if it helped, but he hasn't been underfoot since then, so that's something.

Oh, we learned a bit from Poni about Seven Willows. It was apparently attacked by a Deathlord or Deathknight or Deathcatapult or Deathrabbit or some such. Seriously though, it sounded like dangerous stuff to mess around with. But that's why they pay me the big Talens.

Wait … I AM getting paid for this, right? Right?!

…

Sigh.

At any rate, Illystra and Co. finally caught up with us. When I first saw her, I just sort of stared at her for awhile … her skin nearly glows! OK, not literally, but … I was a bit trembly in the knees for a bit there. She is an old friend of Larian's apparently… hm, which gives me an id… no, I'm definitely NOT committing that to paper. Illystra'd kill me! (*^.^*)

They arrived just as we managed to hit stormy weather. Poor Illystra! Once I re-engaged my brain, I wandered over and taught her how to move with the ship, and that seemed to help her. She's so warm!

Now, the “& Co.” section of the party is a real barrel of laughs, let me tell you. Cathak Perius, the fun-loving! Cathak Perius the outgoing and friendly! Cathak Perius the utterly trustworthy and loyal comrade! Ha!

( ^_^ )Y <— This is me waving at Perius in case he happens to be reading this. Hi, Perius! Mind your own business and stop reading my journal! Kisses! Signed, Magel!

He's an inquisitor, or so he claims. His self-appointed duty is to wander around spying on people, endlessly asking blunt questions regarding their loyalty to the Realm, agenda, character, level of education, geneaology, financial standing, upbringing, and for all I know, personal hygiene. I swear he has less grasp of subtlety and etiquette than Sen'rei did. Mind you, this was merely my first impression of him…

My second, third, fourth … and in fact every subsequent impression haven't done much to change my opinion, however. Especially recently. But I'm getting ahead of myself…

The storms were hardly over when we were attacked by a beast from the depths, some sort of two-headed serpent. That was, I think, the 12th. Illystra killed the creature, beating me to it, so I rescued our young passenger from a rather waterlogged demise. I took her belowdecks to get her out of her wet clothes. She'll please someone rather well in a few years … you read it here first!

Fast as she changed, I think she thought I was about to go for her throat! Sigh…

Oh, Illystra can fly! She has these big firey wings, from some sort of artifact I assume. It's amazing!

Took us only two weeks to reach the Threshold, all told … mostly because the late winter storms were helping us, I assume. Before we got there, though, there was this incident with a pirate ship and a woman calling herself Lantern on Dark Waters with Salt in Her Hair and Some Sleepwalking Guys Hanging Around and Probably Some More Words Here That I'm Forgetting. Ha!

OK, serious time…

She was apparently a Deathlord. Mostly, I think she was warning us. Something about our enemies wanting to release something into Creation. Then we … accidentally sailed into the Underworld. At least, that's what it looked like to me, based on some things I've heard. At first it was kind of overcast and grey. Then the clouds started breaking up. The water turned black, silent, and still. The flapping of the sails grew muted. Then we heard a clanking echoing off in the distance…

Finally, we saw it: The moon, high above the landscape. It glowed red as blood, pulsing to blackness like a slow heartbeat. It was tethered to the ground, with several of these HUGE chains which stretched from horizon to horizon. But it still shifted around slightly, causing the clanking. Then, before our very eyes, it flared brightly and struggled violently against its bonds.

Once, back when I was newly adopted, one of my cousins took me on a hunting trip. Of course, he didn't actually want to catch animals (though I'm not sure which of us ultimately turned out to be the prey…), but before, we did go hunt a few for appearance's sake. One of these was some sort of large cat … it had been wounded and turned to face the hunters. It was in pain, it was cornered and dying … and it wasn't afraid. It was angry. It HATED. I could feel it, almost physically.

That's what the Underworld's moon reminded me of. Somehow, it was aware. It was active. And it hated. A thousand times as strongly as that cat, it hated. It hated enough to reduce me and everyone around me to ash, if hatred could kill and it could get free for just one instant…

And that's the thing that our foes wish to unleash upon our world.

Luckily, I remembered some things that I'd overheard about Shadowlands, and we managed to sail back to where we were supposed to be~~~

Oops. Someone's cold hands are getting a bit adventuresome! I'm going to~~ close this entry for now. I'll pick~~ up … gah, men! … the story later~ wi~~ _{th our arr}~ival in Nexus.

Ja ne!**

Notes

Ganbare ne - Stand your ground, OK?
Tatakae - Keep fighting!
Ja ne - Until next time!

24 Descending Air, Realm Year 768

As I write, it is after midnight. The air is cool on my skin, but the coldest point of winter is long past, so I am not uncomfortable. Larian lies sleeping once again, and I will rejoin him when I have finished my task here.

Where did I leave off?

Oh yes, Nexus. We arrived in port on 19 Descending Air for resupply and such. This was not long after meeting the mysterious woman on the sea. Then we met with Guild representatives to assure them we weren't here to interfere. Illystra went to go beat up some people in the arena, I think. I believe Perius went to the local constabulatorianationism and, near as I can tell, basically told them to give him an unsolved crime to investigate.

Thus, we met with Sesus Lisori, a mortal Dynast who had recently had an odd ring-bracelet piece stolen from her. As it was not obviously valuable and many of her more valuable-looking items were untouched, it was clear that the thief knew what they were after. Mysterious!

Perius suggested (in his ever-so lovable way) that I convince one of the Guild members to help us. What am I, bait for low-life scum? I was so embarrassed! (>_<)

But he did have a point … nobody can resist my charms for long! Ha! (^_~)

Anyway, the guy eventually came back and told us some stuff about the bracelet, where some of the other stolen items were sold, etc. Perius was suspicious (is he ever not?) and somehow learned that the man had been forced not to reveal some other things he knew.

There was this knife made of black glassy material and bone… I only saw it after the fact, but someone threw it at Illystra, I believe. Grr!

So, we decided to go into the sewers for some reason (probably Perius's idea, but I don't really remember now)… (^_^’) There was all sorts of stumbling about behavior, and it turned out that we had actually entered a set of catacombs. We recovered a paper written by the architect of some tomb. Possibly even one of the Tombs of the Anathema in Nexus. And there were apparently people down there when we were exploring! We found another of those knives, but never found the owner, because…

… suddenly, Perius (after dragging us all down there) announces that he no longer cares about solving this mystery after all, and that he was leaving. And so he did. No, that didn't look strange at all, why do you ask? (¬_¬)

The others went back to the inn they were staying at. I went back to the ship. Apparently, in the middle of the night, Nyax sent a messenger to everyone at the inn and told them to get back to the ship because he was leaving for Seven Willows in five minutes. Of course, the ship going up and down on the waves isn't enough to wake me up … we were already well down the river by the time I got up.

Well, whatever. I never cared much for Nexus anyway.

Yesterday, we spotted an encampment on the banks of the river, as if an entire town had been forced into the wilderness. Nyax decided to stop there, acting on some hunch, I assume. It turned out to be refugees from Seven Willows. Lucky!

We met up with the leader of the refugees, who was skittish of us at first. Apparently, she she had had an encounter with a different group of Dragon-blooded after her people fled Seven Willows, possibly an official Wyld Hunt, wherein the refugees' food and other supplies were taken to replenish the Exalt's stores. Obviously the straits of the Dynasts must have been dire indeed to prevent such transcendent ilk from drawing on their decades-honed survival skills, thus placing them in the … unfortunate … position of having to deprive displaced farmers and homeless peasants of their meager scraps in the midst of winter… I can't personally concieve of such a circumstance, nor how one might cope with the resulting stain to one's honor, but then, I guess that's why I'm not in the official Wyld Hunt…

But enough about actions that stain one's honor…

We encountered an Anathema yesterday as well, or so the others said. He had beautiful white skin and was dressed in somewhat morbid looking garb … the quality of the cloth looked excellent, and the outfit seemed well constructed. I'm sure the quality of the bone was equally high. Anyway, he rode up to our camp on his black horse and said his name was Lone Drum Requiem for Blooded Blade. He was here to look for his “sister” and thought she might be with Nyax for some reason. Around this time, there was a storm brewing on the horizon, clearly no natural phenomenon (coming as it did toward the winds).

As he appeared to have information on this storm, Illystra allowed him into our camp to talk under truce, so long as he went unarmed. He abided by these terms. He told us that the storm was the doing of the Deathlord in Seven Willows, because she thought we had the stolen item from Nexus, which was a key to a key, or some such. In other words, we probably should've stuck around Nexus, since the stolen item seems to be related to dragging this moon out of the Underworld. Before he could tell us much else, however, Perius and Ilyra suddenly attacked.

It was a brilliant tactic! Get a solitary foe to think we are trustworthy, remove his weapon, surround him with four or five Exalts and a dozen or more imperial troops, and then attempt to slaughter him. Such courage! I think those two would do even better in the official Wyld Hunt than in our little information gathering mission!

Sadly, it did not have the expected results. The pale man escaped.

Then I had to go to tend to an approaching Guild slaveship, who apparently thought that the refugees would be their next product. I suggested to the captain that neither interfering in an Imperial investigation nor sailing towards a clearly unnatural storm would bring them much profit.

(I don't think that Larian would have forgiven me if I'd let the slavers have their way. I get the sense that something about these refugees and our destination is important to him.)

We then proceeded to load up the refugees to evacuate them, because it was becoming clear that this storm was going to land right in their laps, and it soon became clear thanks to Illystra's kakui wings that the storm actually concealed an army of the undead. We also began making plans to fight.

Perius was suggesting orders for Larian to give for some reason, as if Larian were suddenly in command during this battle. (Despite the fact that Larian had a superior officer standing not five feet away.) No, that didn't look strange at all, either, why? (¬_¬)

Flame being the most likely weapon that would hurt the creatures heading our way, I suggested that we catch them in a crossfire … go around the main force and set a forest fire behind them to block their retreat (trees are dry and leafless right now), while the ships in the river pelted them with more fire.

Everybody sort of stared at me… I guess they thought I was going to suggest breeding them to (a more permanent) death or something.

Sigh. As if the undead are that cute… (9_9)

But that's what we wound up doing, more or less (the crossfire thing, not the breeding thing!)… and it worked! We inflicted severe losses on the enemy! Perius even helped out when I arrived in the midst of the foe by catapult! And then I fought my first Anathema (I assume that's what he was; he was dressed sort of like the first one. A lot more scruffy though, and someone should really teach him how to care for that linen. Nice hair, though) with Illystra's help.

There I was, facing down a charging Deathknight on a nightmare steed, his blade screaming… Cresting Wave held before me, its curves glittering in the light of the sun and flames… steam rising from my body as the flames at my back impinged on my anima; Illystra a glowing meteor, like the breath of the Fire Dragon from the heavens above…

Ooooooo SUGOI!

Ah, sorry. He also got away, though. (T_T)

OK, enough about the smelly army of doom. I skipped over something earlier because I didn't want to end this entry talking about beating up on the bodies of people who aren't people anymore. It happened back before the first pale-skinned man came to our camp…

Apparently, something about the refugees was bothering Larian. Illystra and I were chatting with him for a bit, then he went for a walk. Illystra went with him to talk, and I decided to keep an eye on them in case they were, um, suddenly attacked by, err, giant exalted ferrets. I've heard those are troublesome in this part of the world…

Anyway, eventually Illystra had relieved as much of his tension as she could by talking. So it was my turn… there are ways of speaking to the heart that might invoke the lips but do not require words. (*^_^*)

He made it clear that he's not really interested, outside the bed. “You know I'm using you, right?” is the first thing he asked me (thus, when Perius started playing at whatever he's doing, I put on my most sensual voice and sweetly whispered in his ear that I apparently wasn't the only one being used… the expression he gave was priceless.)

I'm a bit sad, actually. Maybe I'm not really a person to him. That's hardly unusual, but you'd think he'd be a bit different, given his situation. I know that he's not regarded as a prize match in the Realm. He's got an arranged marriage awaiting him to a cousin in the South, but he's not exactly enthusiastic about it.

Ah well. At least he's up front about it, which is more than most. And, well … let's just say that his larger-than-average height is not an isolated characteristic… (^_~)

Hm. It's nearly Years End. I guess we'll miss the usual festivities. Maybe we can have our own. Nani o kite ikou kana?

It's getting pretty late, though, and I'm sure that the next few days are going to be just as exciting. (Especially for Larian, heh, heh, heh. He'll have learned a thing or two by the time he gets around to whatshername…) I'd better get some sleep. Tsukarechatta. (-_-)

Ja ne…

Notes

Kakui - Cool
Sugoi - Awesome, amazing
Nani o kite ikou kana - What shall I wear?
Tsukarechatta - I'm tired